20 Awesome J-Horror Movies Every Horror Fan Should See
3. Audition
Plot: A widower who holds an audition process in order to find a new wife discovers that the woman he falls in love with is not what she seems.
Audition is the stuff nightmares are made of.
It starts out as a very touching, well-written and gently comedic romantic drama, before suddenly morphing into one of the most disturbing films you'll ever watch. It's like flicking a switch.
The complete lack of horror for half the film was an unusual technique but it worked flawlessly. The first half of the film is still great thanks to the terrific writing and it makes the second half even more unsettling, but it's in this second half when the film goes from an excellent movie to an all-time classic.
Thanks to Takashi Miike's brilliant directing, the harrowing violence and an overwhelming sense of horror and fear, Audition is an insidiously frightening work. Like the needles the film's terrifying villain inserts into the protagonist during the film's infamous torture scene, this gets right under your skin and stays there.
Audition is an amazing film and the best Torture-Porn film ever made. Still, you'll never be able to watch it again. It really is that disturbing.